40 damage at agility 5, then its close skill can do 30 damage which means he can output 70 damage in a single turn if he gets killed. He can kill alot of front row lvl 4s easily that have 60 hp or even ernst. Assassins tend to have low hp.

Imagine lebeau with 60 hp and comboing with mulna. Yeah ouch easy to pull off an 80 dmg slash with lebeau if yer not facing a file that have dragon breath to throw at mulna to prevent a 80 dmg slash, or magic bolts but magic bolts is moar expensive than dragon breath but whatevah. Lebeau only got better with close skill added, before he didn't use to have it he wasn't that scary but he's now scary with that close skill. Pop him out early in the duel where field is light and he can wreck face.

And killing lebeau isn't free cuz of his close skill. If you think 30 damage is nothing then why is Folrart Guardian one of the most present tanks in folrart arena. Yeah that's right, she counters for 30 damage and people don't like losing 30 hp.

If you wanna talk boring i can open a whole book for you how boring and overlapping Falkow been for the past YEARS? I've seen boring. Predictable has gotten a name in Alteil and it has the color blue.

You, me and Logress knows it. Falkow been showing the least diversity last time we heard of it.So do you really want to speak about Falkow and whats 'least boring' for this game, Gon? About what happens if only 1 option is presented as the best end-all solution? How boring do you think it has become to see Return, on a scale of 1~10? I don't understand why you want to keep old stigma in place but i'm advocating for more solutions to mix things up.

Counterplay doesn't have to be so dull. Add other mechanics for them to do so. Let fieldpositioning play a bigger role in counterstrategy and create units that profit (or counter) with this. Lets grims interact with their own units to then solve a threat.There are enough unique and flavored options within Falkow to evolve. Enough ways to deal with a threat. But there's no point as long as you can instantly click a problem away when it appears.

angelspawns wrote:If you wanna talk boring i can open a whole book for you how boring and overlapping Falkow been for the past YEARS? I've seen boring. Predictable has gotten a name in Alteil and it has the color blue.

You, me and Logress knows it. Falkow been showing the least diversity last time we heard of it.So do you really want to speak about Falkow and whats 'least boring' for this game, Gon? About what happens if only 1 option is presented as the best end-all solution? How boring do you think it has become to see Return, on a scale of 1~10? I don't understand why you want to keep old stigma in place but i'm advocating for more solutions to mix things up.

Counterplay doesn't have to be so dull. Add other mechanics for them to do so. Let fieldpositioning play a bigger role in counterstrategy and create units that profit (or counter) with this. Lets grims interact with their own units to then solve a threat.There are enough unique and flavored options within Falkow to evolve. Enough ways to deal with a threat. But there's no point as long as you can instantly click a problem away when it appears.

You complain about return being Falkow's only real tool, but the fact is that Falkow itself doesn't have many ways to take advantage of field positioning, and engaging (and taking advantage of that engage) is far more expensive for falkow than it has to be.

SP is the name of the game, and the only SP-efficient answer Falkow has to a lot of things it returns, since that trades SP for SP, whereas things like engage+rasam drink SP like no tomorrow, and moving things around sort of has no point if you have no way of keeping units there.

Now if teleport and flanking attack ENGAGED those units for that turn (and RFA action) so that they'd actually stay where you put them, that'd be huge and would actually make fieldmons viable. Maybe.

1) I featured LeBeau in the file I used in the tournament of champions last december and placed 7th - a lot higher than a lot of other notable players. 2) I'm not really sure why you're so fixated on return grims (cyclone tidal return wrath) in falkow? Yes, the sphere is, by design, reliant on return grims. Get over it. Gowen is reliant on damage grims and direct damage effects. Refess is reliant on snowball start skills. You can make the same exact argument you're making about any sphere in the game.

AqvasFire2 wrote:You complain about return being Falkow's only real tool, but the fact is that Falkow itself doesn't have many ways to take advantage of field positioning, and engaging (and taking advantage of that engage) is far more expensive for falkow than it has to be.

SP is the name of the game, and the only SP-efficient answer Falkow has to a lot of things it returns, since that trades SP for SP, whereas things like engage+rasam drink SP like no tomorrow, and moving things around sort of has no point if you have no way of keeping units there.

Now if teleport and flanking attack ENGAGED those units for that turn (and RFA action) so that they'd actually stay where you put them, that'd be huge and would actually make fieldmons viable. Maybe.

I say keep the ideas coming! That's exactly the kind of evolving i'd like to see for Falkow. That when i play my lvl3 threat, Falkow ...

plays an openskill that moves it to Spot 7!? And there's a Falkow unit on the field that engages units in Spot 7! What a surprise. Guess i'll have to move my Silverion next turn before it can attack.But wait, the Move Unit with openskill also has a start: switch Rng with target unit... damn, now it gave me 1 Rng! Thankfully it's nearly dead, i'll kill it with my next...*Meanwhile the Spot7 Engager gave all Falkow units HP+10 for each engaged unit*... wtf... Seriously hating Rosa right now.

Yeah, it can be fun and it can be done. The sphere, by design, does NOT have to be reliant on return grims to solve a threat. Things can be more surprising then playing a Lvl3 Grim.

Angel, I've tried the whole field mechanic. It really isn't that great, because you're using a bunch of otherwise subpar units dependent on subpar grims that you can counter with a simple *move* command if you're faster than 2 agility. You know, frog+RFA+tree giant+giant gorilla+giant forest snake? AKA set 4 monsters with gorilla and tiger?

It really doesn't work all that well because the units are very poor outside of potentially hurting your opponent once in a blue moon if you somehow manage to set everything up.

Now, if flanking attack read:

Switch opponent's units from 1-2-3 to 7-8-9 and vice versa, and engage all units moved this way on a level 2 grim, that'd be absolutely terrific. If teleport moved and engaged a unit for that turn, that'd also be freaking amazing (you'd have to put a conditional falkow level on that though so you don't get other spheres splashing a level 1 to engage better than petrification/soul bind but w/e).

But just take a look at the other Falkow grims.

Frozen lance--2 SP to set opponent's agility to 0 for that turn, with no additional field presence next turn that refunds your SP when it dies. So why use that above undine?Deep sleep--2 SP to engage one unit, and sometimes, you don't even need the second turn (EG you're going to smash it with the serpent that turn, or you need to hit them with a return engaged SS).Teleport/flanking attack: you get -SP, and your opponent might just hit the *move* button and it'd be worthless.Time stop--okay you engaged your opponent's units. Now what exactly do you have in mind to do with your silly little archmages? Spend 1 more SP subtracting 40 from everything? Oh great, you just spent 4 SP on a one-time attack. Oh, and then your opponent might trigger an SS, revive some other ones, and is way ahead in the SP race. Now if we had a sorcerer type unit that did for time stop what Folrart mage does for magic bolt (okay seriously wtf is up with Refess getting the attack grim buff anyway?), then we'd talk.Eldritch hands--so after you get grimcount up to 12, you're paying 3 SP for 60 damage? Is this a joke?

In other words, it isn't that "omfg why is Falkow so dependent on returns when it has all these other options in its grims", it's that all the other grims are so inconsistent or their numbers are so ridiculously bad that Falkow simply has no other options.

And Gon, as for Gowen depending on more than just damage grims, what sort of grims do you have in mind? Buffing grims, like song for a hero? Well, the condition attached to that is completely obnoxious. Fairy dance? Yes, let's overextend ourselves and then use a defensive buff on a sphere that isn't really good at that anyway. Ignition? Only useful on one unit. Etc...

And Refess now snowballing: I wish. But now no matter which Refess tribe you want to play, it's got plenty of snowball support that you'd be dumb as a rock not to use.

@Gon: That's why he has testers. Or is he thinking everything up by himself?

It isn't that hard to think outside of returns, or work around it for that matter? If Grims is what keeps the units squishy Falkow units could get additional stats if no Grims are played. Have you guys considered capitalizing on the RNG removal (ala Azure Dragon, Undine Soldier) and Field Positioning (ala MermGirlSorc, RFA, Ladol) or Stat switching (ala Snaf, Blade Wyvern)... alot can be made into a viable strategy against other rushes.

Where's all the creativity in the design team at exactly? Is everything already set in stone by JP? Stuff is getting boring and repetitive. Not just for Falkow, but also Refess (more buff def and atk... again...) Lawt (more closeskill dmg... again...). I only see Gowen improve actually in creative options, but it was a pretty mindless clicking sphere.

@DG: I totally agree on adding more options and bringing more viability to them. Not to bring more OP but diversity. In that regard, i'd like to see some seperation between return dependant rushes and ones without. The return dependant Falkow is very much present in the "Alltime Top 10 RP" to go without more strong options. You don't want to ADD upon that, but create more options besides them. Atleast that's how i feel.

I dunno I really don't do anything anymore. It's not really worth my time plus I'm not motivated to do anything for this game anymore. Most of stuff in news sets has historically always been logress + some mysterious other people and we just did lab rat type testing. Things might be changing slightly now, not sure.

I do agree with you though that there's a lot more potential "design space" that's been chronically ignored.